Washed Away Gem Revised Edition
by Neka-chan
Summary: This is a new and hopefully improved version of the story I wrote 8 years ago. Enjoy. AxH
1. I Hate My Name

(AN: I wrote 'Washed Away Gem' when I was 13. Needless to say as I grew older I thought that it was crap and I could do way better. I've been wanting to rewrite it ever since I was 16 or 17. However, thanks to my latest comment on it, I've decided to bring it up out of the dead and try again. So huge shout out to **kitaxhaku** for making it happen. =D I haven't read **"A Boy Named Bobby"** yet, but I'm definitely planning to as soon as I'm done rewriting this.

Those of you who've read and liked my story, I'm hoping you love this one now that it's fleshed out and the behaviors of people are better explained rather than just thrown at your face as I scream at you, "Just take it! Who needs explanations for out of character behavior?????" =p So here's my old story with a new feel and a few changes in some events. So it's like the old story, but a bit different. Or whatever. Love it!!! Peace! ::heart::)

**Chapter 1**

I Hate My Name

~*~*~*Flashback*~*~*~

_"Arnold!" Helga cried in a panic as she was swept away by the rushing water._

_I froze as I watched her as she was taken farther and farther away. Her deep blue eyes never left mine, burning their image into my head. She looked at me with such fear and regret. She mouthed something at me before the current sucked her in completely._

~*~*~*End flashback*~*~*~

"Helga!" I screamed as I pushed myself up from my bed in a pool of my own sweat and tears. Her voice rang in my head as she cried out my name. I shut my eyes tightly as I begged silently to know why. Why did she have to call out my name? And then, as if knowing the answer immediately, my eyes turned towards my fold in couch. Behind it was Helga's shrine to me, boxed up. There was enough room behind that couch to store a whole person. In fact, I remember Helga had been in there for reasons I'm still not entirely sure. Either way, it had enough room to hold all of the stuff Helga had dedicated to me. Images, poems, puppets, things I didn't want to see, but didn't have the heart to throw away. She had loved me so diligently and believed in me so much that the sight of her hard work were like constant reminders that I had failed her when she needed me the most. She loved me no matter how many times I brushed past her, no matter how much she hurt because I woulden't look at her - really look at her - and see the love she had for me. Sure I saw that she was really a good person, but I refused to acknowledge what exactly she'd been hiding. And me? I couldn't even save her life. I hate my images just as much as I hate my name.

I looked at the clock that read, "3:36 A.M." Even the clock was normal now. I couldn't stand my personalized clock and threw it out shortly after the incident. I shook my head as I thought, _'Four hours of sleep, huh? Guess tonight was a good night.'_ I knew there would be no going back to sleep though. Not with her eyes fresh in my mind, waiting behind my eyelids, begging me to save her and asking why I didn't. And her voice. I could still hear it echoing in my mind, crying out my name. I hate hearing her cry out my name. I **hate** my name.

I reached for my phone and dialed one of the two most used numbers I knew. It was really late so I knew I couldn't wake up Gerald without feeling bad for it. I usually saved him for the bad nights when I barely slept an hour or less before Helga haunted me again. No, tonight was a good night so I would call the person who I didn't care if I woke up.

"Mmm...hello?" a very tired voice answered and only after a brief moment of silence continued, "Arnold...it's ever so late to be calling here..." I guess she must've looked at the clock or something. Plus, as far as I know, I'm the only one who calls her this late at night anyway.

I could hear a faint masculine voice in the back ground grunting as though he'd been nudged awake. _'Yes,' _I thought, _'it's time for you to head on your way and make room for her official boyfriend.'_

"Arnold?" she spoke again when I didn't say anything. "Are you coming over or..." she hesitated for a minute, and for good reason too. If she thought I ever wanted to actually talk to her about what I was going through again she'd be an idiot. I haven't said anything to her about Helga since I realized she was cheating on me.

"Yeah..." I told her before she could voice the idiotic continuance of her question. "I'll be there in a bit." With that statement I hung up and went to look for my pants.

Lila was there for me when I couldn't cope with Helga's loss. Gerald tried to help out, but Phoebe had taken it the hardest and I could tell he wanted to help her through it. I backed away from Gerald during that time and allowed Lila to come in and help me. And she did a bit. As best she could. For that, I am extremely grateful to her. At some point, we even started dating. I was getting a lot of pressure from my friends to date her since she was always around me and it just made sense. A lot of them forgot about Helga fairly quickly so I guess they assume I'd done the same. Around middle school, I gave in and finally asked her to be my girlfriend. I didn't really expect her to considering I thought she didn't care about me in that way, but I guess after all the time we spent together I must've grew on her.

We dated for a year before her father got promoted and decided Lila would be better off in private school. After that, she started talking about having sex. I, however, told her I wasn't ready for it, which she seemed to respect and only occasionally mentioned it again after our initial conversation about it. Now don't get me wrong, Lila is a very attractive girl. Has been since elementary school and still is. Of course I didn't mind the idea of having sex with her. I just didn't feel right about it for some reason. I mean we fooled around a little, which satisfied her, but we never really did anything sexual. I already had a guilty pang in my stomach whenever I kissed her. Maybe it was because I had Helga's shrine to me, but with her being dead it really wasn't reasonable for a perfectly healthy, straight, teenage boy like myself to hold back when his girlfriend was clearly willing. Despite that knowledge, I still backed down when she brought it up. However, as time went by, Lila started to really talk about having sex, insisting that she wanted me to take her virginity, which, for some reason, sounded like it had to be soon. I really didn't see the hurry, but eventually it was all she would talk about. When I took about all I could stand of her whining that she was the only virgin in her class, I caved.

Now, at the time, I was no genius in bed, but I knew stuff. Again, I was a healthy, _curious_ teenage boy. Of course I've seen a good deal of pornography and I know what sex generally consists of in the norm and in the extremes. The things Lila knew when we got down to it really surprised me and if it wasn't for the little bit of blood on the condom, I would've seriously questioned the validity towards the claim that she was a virgin. Either way, she left me alone after that, which wasn't completely a bad thing because, to be perfectly honest, I felt disgusting after that. Maybe it was her suspiciously good moves or the fact that it felt like Helga was watching me what with her shrine burning a hole into my couch just across the room. However, after that first time, I realized that in that moment when I came there was nothing but pleasure. No pain, no self loathing, no guilt. Nothing. It took me a lot of strength to resist the temptation to use Lila as a means of forgetting Helga, even for just the briefest moment. But she'd been too good to me for me to justify doing that to her.

At least those were my feelings until I realized she was cheating on me. Then all resistance went out the window. The smarter, _safer_ thing to do would be to give her the boot, but she was already willing to fuck me and finding other people to use would be difficult and too much effort. No, if it meant getting rid of the feelings I have towards Helga's death then I'd do it. However, if Lila was already willing, why should I bother looking for anyone else?

I started up the packard Grandpa gave me last year for my sixteenth birthday. We're not sure if he's gonna die in 3 years or not, but he's still alive and kicking. Grandma, however, wasn't so lucky. She died a little before I began dating Lila. In fact, I think her death was what made me try dating Lila. Indirectly anway. Grandpa used to come into my room every night whenever I woke up screaming. When Grandma died, I began to notice it was really taking a toll on him what with mourning her loss and helping me through mine. I had my room soundproofed when I began to notice - spending most of the nights at Gerald's during the time I worked on it - and after beginning to date Lila, it was easy convincing him that I had moved on from Helga's death. A bit too easy, but that's fine with me. He did all he could and with Gerald there for my mental support and recently Lila for my physical support, I was happy to take the torch of responsibility away from him.

I parked my truck a little ways away from Lila's house and made my way around to her bedroom window, where I'm assuming her previous fling had just left through. As I entered through the open window, I saw Lila naked on her bed, waiting for me. She looked like she'd just taken a shower, but I could smell the last guy's cheap cologne on her bed sheets. Oh well. At least I didn't have to think about having sloppy seconds...or thirds. Either way, though, it didn't matter. She was the only way I could forget my burden and I'll make her stay up the rest of the night doing just that. She usually didn't make many sounds during either, which was fine with me. For a while she kept faking it for me and calling out my name and everything. I made her stop. First of all, her pleasure was not on my list so I didn't care if I was good or not. Second, her moans just reminded me more of what a whore she was. And third. I. Hate. My. Name.

End of Chapter One

(AN: By the way, in case you all want to read the old version of this story (if you're curious about how things will end up and all or you just happen to like the older version better) it's still up on my site. Just click my name and poof. You're there. Anyway, Chapter Two is on it's way.)


	2. My Angel In Pink

(AN: I suppose I should've added this in the first chapter but Hey Arnold! and it's characters are not mine. They're Craig Bartlett's (sp?)

Edit: Seems I did forget a few things. XD Sowwy about that. As I grew older I lost a bit of my memory capacity it would seem. My mistake. Thanks for the point out there. Wouldn't have noticed that myself until much later XD)

**Chapter 2**

My Angel In Pink

"Hey, man," Gerald greeted me when he came up to my locker, offering me our usual handshake, which, of course, I returned. "Phil called this morning to see if you were at my place. Guess he heard your shot gun truck pulling out last night and wanted to check up on you. I told him you were in the shower."

"Thanks, Gerald," I replied as I picked out a couple of my books and put some back. Grandpa doesn't mind me going to Lila's per se, but he finds it fairly 'ungentlemanly' of me to call on a 'lady' so late at night. So I usually have Gerald as a cover, which he's been pretty cool about.

"When are you gonna drop that girl? You're gonna catch something."

"That's not the worse thing that could happen. And anyway, it's too much work to find someone else. Not to mention, I kind of think 'she' wouldn't mind if I used Lila this way. 'She' didn't really like her that much." I never actually say Helga's name when I can help it. It just made me want to crawl back into bed for a hundred years.

"Helga wouldn't like it," I heard Phoebe say behind me. She really wasn't very sympathetic to me at all. She's the one who gave me Helga's shrine after she asked Big Bob if she could have some of Helga's stuff. She wanted me to take care of it and no matter how much I protested she refused to throw it out or keep it herself. She didn't care at all about the pain it caused me to have all of Helga's hard work dedicated to me let alone how much just her name caused me. It could be that she doesn't think Helga's dead at all. No one ever found her body and Phoebe has been clinging to that for these past 7 or 8 years. I am pretty firm in thinking Helga's dead, which I used to make sure Phoebe knew so I guess there's a bit of animosity between us because of it. "Helga will be very upset you're sharing yourself so intimately with that Lila girl."

I glared at Phoebe for a moment, her own gaze never faltering from mine. It was like she was challenging me to try and smash her hopes again. If she wasn't Gerald's girlfriend, I wouldn't hesitate to shut her down. Instead, I walked off for my homeroom class.

"Aw, Pheebs," I heard Gerald sigh when he thought I was out of earshot, "take some pity on him. He's in pain."

"He's not the only one," she protested. They had the same homeroom as I did so they were walking along behind me with, what they thought, was an appropriate distance. I'm sure Phoebe knew I could hear, but she wasn't about to tell Gerald. Like I said, she doesn't care about how I feel about Helga's death. "And think about how Helga will feel when she comes back only to find he's philandering with that Lila girl."

"You know..." Gerald told her carefully, though I knew what he was going to say and he's told Phoebe this a million times, "it's not like he likes her anyway. He can 'philander' anyone he wants. Helga had no claim on him before she...left."

I rolled my eyes and walked faster to my classroom so I couldn't hear anymore. I hated how Gerald catered to Phoebe's whims when it came to Helga. I konw he knows she's not coming back lest she comes back for brains, but after he let that slip with Phoebe, she lectured him for days about it. He gave in after that, not wanting to face her wrath towards the subject again.

I rounded the corner to my homeroom only to stop abruptly. I barely even heard Gerald and Phoebe's steps come up behind me and then stop themselves. I was in too much shock. It was like seeing a ghost. No. Not a ghost. And angel. A beautiful angel in pink. My heart was pumping so hard against my chest that for the briefest moment, I thought it was going to burst from my chest and fly into her pocket along with her collection of all the other guys' in the classroom.

Two golden braids were woven around the back of her head, framing it before they came together in one, long glorious braid that seemed to go on forever down her slender waist until it reached her hips. Instantly I imagined what her hair would look like loose. It was even longer, past her hips for sure, and my imagination even went so far as to see it covering her naked form like she was Venus herself.

I froze when she turned her head to look at me. Oh god, those eyes. They were amazing. I felt like I could drown in those sparkling blue waters around her pupils. My eyes never left hers. I was like a deer in headlights. Two wonderfully blue headlights. It wasn't until Gerald gave me a good nudge that I realized I had been standing there a bit longer than appropriate. Both Ms. Jenkins and this angel were looking at me as though I had two heads. I think Ms. Jenkins even asked me something, but who could hear anything when they got sucked into those eyes. Not just her eyes, but her entire presence. This girl. This Olga look-alike...no. Not Olga. This girl was more...more...there were no words to describe her.

I was lost again. Gerald had to take my arm just to get me to go to our desks. I could just barely hear the laughter of the girls in the class, but I knew the boys knew where I was coming from. They might not have it as bad as me, but this angel has taken all of our hearts with just a look. After having taken in all that there was to this girl, I began to notice her blue eyes had darkened a bit. She was getting angry at me, but she wouldn't break my gaze. She was strong. She wasn't going to let anyone intimidate her no matter how unintentional it might be. When I realized she was getting upset, I forced myself to look somewhere else. Only then did I realize Ms. Jenkins was speaking.

"...and she was transferred here from the east. Why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself, Hel-" my breath caught and in that nanosecond millions of thoughts ran through my mind. She _does_ look like Helga. What if Phoebe was right all along? What if Helga's alive? What if that's her? "en." Helen. A soft sigh of disappointment slipped from my lips as I slouched in my chair and my heart began to beat again. So it wasn't Helga. I straightened up a bit. So what? I knew Helga wasn't going to come back. She's dead. She's been dead these past 7 years. And then it hit me. The angel was speaking and here I was thinking about a dead girl. Who cares if she wasn't Helga? Helen had managed to brighten me up completely inside and out. No one has ever done that.

"...and I really enjoy poetry," she was saying. A soft humble look touched her face as she added, "I write a little of it on my own, but it's just for fun. Nothing really special. Um, that's really all there is to say about me."

"Well, if you like poetry," Ms. Jenkins told her, "you should definitely look into sending your work to the school's newspaper." My ears perked up. I ran the newspaper. One of the many things I've been trying to do to keep my mind off Helga. "They always want students to submit their poems and short stories for their fine arts section. Talk to Arnold about it," she added as she gestured to me.

I froze when Helen's gaze followed Ms. Jenkins's hand to me. It killed me a little to see disappointment pass across her face. I offered a small, apologetic smile. Hopefully, my stupid trance hadn't completely scared her away from me. "Anyway, you can have a seat next to Phoebe over there," Ms. Jenkins said, gesturing to the empty desk behind me. A chill went down my spine as she walked over towards the seat, her eyes forward and her chin high. I glanced a little to the side to see if I could get a glimpse of her. I didn't see her, but I did notice Phoebe with a similar phased out look on her face when Helen passed between Gerald and I to get to her desk. What was she thinking about Helen? Did she also get that feeling I did about her style and coloring matching Helga's? If she did then I wouldn't be surprised that she was clinging to it. She was the only one left who believed Helga was alive. Even Big Bob and them believed that Helga is dead. They were some of the first to believe it actually. Not surprising considering how much they neglected her.

Phoebe's eyes slid over to mine and at one point looked a bit questioning. Not as to why I was looking at her, but rather if I agreed about something. Then I realized I'd hit it on the nose. She did think this girl was Helga. My eyes narrowed and I turned forward again with a little scoff. I'd already brushed that thought and sent it packing. Helen couldn't be Helga. They just seemed so different. No offense to Helga's memory, but Helen seemed to hold herself up with more confidence and grace. And Helga definitely wouldn't be so public about her interest in poetry.

"What you should do," I heard Rhonda whisper to Helga from my other side, "is forget about that silly poetry, newspaper nonsense and join the fashion club. You look like you have the potential to be promoted quickly into our council." She had a point. Helga had a good style to her. Granted it was mostly pink and white, which wasn't bad, but I remember a couple weeks ago Rhonda was going on about red being the new pink and black was the new white or something stupid like that.

"Thank you..." I heard Helen reply nonchalantly, "but I'm really not interested in fashion. I really just wear what I like."

I raised my brow. Every girl would kill to be in Rhonda's club. Rhonda herself seemed to know this because when she spoke again, she sounded offended, "Maybe because you're new, you don't understand the privilege you have of being invited into my club. There's a huge waiting list to get in and I've personally bumped you to the top. Now what do you say?"

Helen was quiet a moment and I moved a little to get a look at her. She was just grinning at Rhonda. She didn't look pensive or anything like she was considering Rhonda's "generous" offer. "It sounds like your club is really more about power than it is about fashion or anything fun really," Helen finally told Rhonda. "And since that's the case, I definitely know now that I am one hundred percent not interested in joining."

Rhonda inhaled sharply as though she'd been punched in the face; something someone should've done ages ago. "No one says no to me. Do you even know who I am? I'm Rhonda Wellington Lloyd! Part of one of the wealthiest families in this town."

"Good for you. Now be quiet. You're making me lose my place." I looked a bit when she looked down and forward again only to notice she'd been reading a book. I couldn't tell which one it was and I found myself really curious to know, but I couldn't see without turning around completely. I didn't, though, because I'm sure she was already annoyed with all the stares she'd been getting ever since I saw her.

"How dare you! I'm to be treated with much more respect than that!"

Helen looked a bit pensive before she shook her head slowly, "Nooo...no, I don't think I meant to be respectful at all."

"Why you --"

"That's enough Rhonda!" Ms. Jenkins snapped. She was a pretty neglegent teacher to begin with, but Rhonda was beginning to sound like a broken record. "Sit down!" Everyone cheered in agreement, all of us very tired of Rhonda constantly telling us how much better she was than we are. Especially when we all knew better than that. With an angry huff at all of us, Rhonda sat down and was silenced.

As homeroom went on, I became more and more aware of Helen behind me. I could hear each page rustle and turn as she read her book. I wanted to talk to her, but I was worried that I might have scared her off. When the bell rang for us to go to our first period, I had decided that I would at least apologize for gawking at her. She walked passed my desk to go on her way so I hurriedly gathered my things so I wouldn't miss her. She disappeared out the door as I stood up and for a moment I was worried that she was gone, but when I got out to the halls I saw her glancing at her schedule and looking around. I saw my chance to not only apologize but maybe help her. I wouldn't mind being late for escorting her to her next class.

"Helen," I said gently as I approached her, flinching inwardly when she looked up at me and her eyes narrowed a little at me. "Ah...I'm sorry about earlier. I didn't mean to just stare at you like that. I had a friend who looked a bit like you when I was younger. I was startled a bit. I'm really sorry if I made you uncomfortable."

For a minute, I was worried she was going to yell at me or something, but I was pleasantly surprised when her features softened a bit. "Oh, it's all right," she told me. "I've been getting that a lot lately. I feel like I've met a lot of the people I've seen around this school when I first got here." She shrugged a little as she looked down at her schedule again, murmuring a little, "I guess you're bound to run into look alikes everywhere if you live in a place long enough."

"I thought you came from the east," I said, a little confused by her statement. Had she lived here this entire time?

"I did, but it really wasn't that far. It was the next town over actually, but still. People come and go and all that, you know."

"Ah, yeah, I guess that's true. So are you lost? Maybe I can help you through here. I have been going to this campus for 3 years and then some."

She looked up at me and smiled. Oh god, what a smile it was. I couldn't help but smile back. I don't think I've genuinely smiled in a long time. "That would be nice," she said as she moved closer to me to show me her schedule. "My first class is English in room 201."

"Really?" There must be a God. After so many years of doubting Him, here He was. Delivering this angel to me. "You have pretty much the same classes as I do. Your art class is next to my journalism class so you won't get lost there. Ah, I don't take calculus though, but I'd be happy to show you where it is."

"I have calculus," I heard Phoebe say behind me. It took all I had not to glower at her for interrupting the time I had with Helen. She came between us and looked at Helen's schedule. "Yeah, you have it the same time I do. Right after we all get out of gym. That's lucky. We can go to it together...if that's okay with you."

Helen was looking at Phoebe a bit strangely at first. Not like she was upset or anything that Phoebe just shoved herself into the conversation. Just, strangely. It was a brief look before she smiled brightly and said as she nodded, "That would be great. It's very nice of you two to help me out so much. I'm Helen by the way," she added to Phoebe as she put up her hand, which Phoebe eagerly shook.

"I'm Phoebe. It's really nice to meet you." She released Helen's had a bit reluctantly it looked like and checked her watch. "We all better get to class. We only have five minutes between classes. I'll see you guys in gym." She said goodbye to us and walked with Gerald to their class in the opposite direction.

"We should get going too," I told Helen after a moment, noticing her watching Phoebe leave.

She turned to me and nodded with that smile that could make me do anything she wanted me to. "Lead the way." I smiled brightly, the natural, almost involuntary upward curve of my lips feeling so strange after so many years of forcing it. Helen made me feel so great. She really must be an angel sent from heaven to relieve me of all the pain I've suffered these past years. I was so grateful. So happy to have this angel in pink.

End of Chapter 2

(AN: So I guess the first chapter was a bit darker than the original. Sorry about that. Really, my beef with my last story was that it seemed like Arnold was using Lila before she cheated on him which made me kinda feel bad for her and kind of hate Arnold. Really the feelings aren't that different in the first chapter of this revised edition and the original it's just that I wanted to further explain just how badly the experience of losing someone who relied on him was effecting him, but he was still a nice guy that he wouldn't use someone without some sort of provocation. If that makes sense. Anyway, if you've continued through this second chapter then I hope that means I haven't frightened you off. I'm aiming for this story to get brighter and brighter as we go. I enjoy drama and angst as much as the next girl, but I do like happy endings. =p Anyway, hope you enjoyed chapter 2. Chapter 3 will be a little slower because I didn't have all or half of it written down so I'll be making up the rest as we go. Creativity takes time so bare with me. ::heart::)


End file.
